#please remember that this blog is not a democracy and as such i am not obliged to follow the fandom's ideas

[notdrifting]

some quick notes on my portrayal of lady d and shipping under the cut - ah, also ? please be mindful and respectful that me sharing my own hcs and portrayal do not necessarily mean that i claim that other hcs and portrayals of other muns are wrong. everybody is entitled to their own hcs and understandings of characters, there’s literally no right or wrong there.

as i have mentioned before  i do not accept nor ship maidens/lady d, she wouldn’t fuck nor fall in love with her own food - with that being said, shipping with her is complicated.  and i feel compelled to express my firm stance against endorsing or engaging in any romantic plots or shipping involving lady d and the maidens under her employ. i see such relations as deeply problematic due to not only the inherent power imbalance in their dynamics and the exploitative nature of their relationship. as much as a queer icon as she is to us all, it is crucial to remember that alcina is and will always be ( except perhaps in aus, of course ) a cruel vampire who feasts on human flesh and effectively keeps these girls as pretty much prisoners/slaves, considering them far beneath her and her daughters in the food chain, depriving them of their autonomy and personhood. with that in mind, romanticising such a relationship could not only perpetuate harmful tropes, but also normalize abuse ( which is a big no no as you can see in my rules ), and i don’t want any of that here. alcina's callous disregard for the well-being of the maidens is an essential aspect of her character, and any attempt to force her into a romantic relationship with them would pretty much undermine her consistency as a character and the gravity of her actions. furthermore, this sort of relationship portrayal may lead to a faux idea that abusive dynamics can be redeemed through love, a notion that can be harmful and manipulative. i am always eager to explore alternative storylines that empower the maidens though, allowing them to break free from their oppressive situations, form supportive bonds, and assert their agency. so yes, i am steering clear of romanticizing these harmful relationships, however in case anyone wants to explore other dynamics i’m 100% here for it. lady d probably would never fall in love or be attracted to a human, that is a regular human, as she finds weakness ( and she deems all humans weak ) disgusting. to get her attention they need to be powerful but not enough to pose as a threat to her or her daughters.

i write her a sapphic demisexual demiromantic as, to me personally, it makes sense considering what i saw of her and the other hcs i have for her - although most hc ( and i say hc because it wasn’t formally confirmed nor denied by capcom itself and despite one of the writers giving his opinion on it in a rather jkr w/ albus fashion, as it is re8 is a collaborative work and in the end the decision to make something canon or not is capcom’s ) her as a lesbian and i have no issue with that,  as a fellow queer i do find the entire man-hating-lesbian trope to be rather harmful. my main issue with this trope is that it follows patriarchal, hetero-normative ideas that often refuse to acknowledge the idea that a relationship between two women can exist on its own without having anything to do with men  ( as most hcs that i have seen are deeply linked to her misandrist personality and the mindset that just because she hates men she is automatically a lesbian ), the trope is flawed, simple minded and rather disrespectful to the sapphic community ( the trope suggests same-sex relationships are rooted solely in disdain for men, trivializing and undermining genuine emotions and love within them ). now, does that mean you cant hc her as lesbian? of course you can! her being lesbian or not is not the issue, hcing her as a lesbian should have nothing to do with this bad trope and we are all free to hc whatever we want that makes sense and relates to us individually, but let us all be mindful of the sexist tropes the fandomTM and the media loves to apply to female characters. as it is, since no official announcement has been made by capcom regarding the character so far, i will write her within the aro/ace spectrum for my own comfort, which i will  explain best in the next section

although she is within the aro/ace spectrum i don’t necessarily belive her to be sex repulsed per se,  though it is worth noting she is nowhere near inclined on having flings or one night stands at all -  ever since day one that she called the attention of the re fandom and from all sort of people, sadly as it usually goes with attractive female characters in media, she was painfully fetishised to no end. that makes me severly uncomfortable and has driven me off from writing her in the past. my portrayal will not focus on her sex appeal to the point of objectifying her, if at all. i want to go beyond that and bring out  depth and authenticity, exploring more than just her appearance. lady d is a lot more than just “tall vampire mommy makes me go brrrr”  she's complex and fascinating, that's why i think it'd be awesome to showcase her forming deep emotional bonds before experiencing sexual or romantic attraction ( if any ). this adds a whole new layer to her identity, and while i'm totally down for some fun shipping, it will be handled it with care. i’m all about respect and creating inclusive fan content that celebrates her character and explores different aspects of her life and relationships.  so while her natural despite for men in general still remains and her usual cruelty to those women who serve her is also present, she'll be free to explore relationships within her demi orientation in case plotting happens. of course some lighthearted flirting might appear every once in a while, but they will be nothing but crack. for actual shipping severe plotting is necessary.

[achillessulks]

i'm a nosy mfer... i want to know: whats your actual nationality? if u cant say for privacy reasons i accept a region (if u dont want to say to be mysterious thats also fair) 2. how do u know so many languages? thats all.

Nosy, but clearly not dedicated... >.>

I've been rather embarrassingly obvious about where I'm from, both on this blog (which I don't use very much any more) and on my Goodreads account (which I use more frequently). I am not, actually, going to tell you all that information—what would be the fun in that? (please don't actually dox me though)—but, if I remember correctly, you should be able to determine, by a careful reading, not only my country of origin but also the region and even city in which I was born. Where I'm currently living is a bit more closely guarded, for good reason (none of your business), but I've made no secret that it's a Western democracy. Which one? That is off-limits, for privacy reasons. (But also I have no connection to this specific country in particular, so it shouldn't matter.)

Anyway, to the second part of your question: I was very lucky to spend an impressionable part of my childhood in an environment where multiple languages were spoken within the household, and I regularly encountered people of various backgrounds and ethnicities as a child. I was encouraged to learn communication; I started reading independently when I was two. Apart from growing up bilingual, I also studied linguistics pretty extensively as a teenager and young adult.

The "secret" (I guess) is that I'm really only functionally bilingual. I know a lot of pieces of a lot of different languages, which makes me look more impressive than I really am—the difference between most polyglots you'll see online and people like me (i.e., kids who grew up in blended households) is that internet polyglots pretend that having a conversational grasp of a language equals fluency, which it... does not, at all—but yeah, I studied a lot, not just linguistics but also specific languages, and spent a lot of time around people who only spoke languages I didn't know, and didn't know any languages I spoke. How do you communicate in that situation? Well, somebody's gotta learn something. And I like to impress people, so.

Also, and I really can't stress this enough: I studied translation. Translation studies as a field will help more than almost anything in understanding how a language is composed, constructed, and utilised; it will help you quickly pick up on when a translation doesn't fit the original; it will give you a good critical eye for not only what someone is saying but also how they are saying it. It is not an exaggeration to say that my experience in translation studies did more for my ability of rapid language acquisition than anything else except for, probably, the total immersion I got when I went to Belgium and was accosted by German-speaking tourists who thought I was Belgian but they didn't know any language other than German, for example. There are other examples—total immersion, like a baby when it's first learning how to Do Language Properly, is the absolute best way to learn basically anything—but the point stands.

Also also, I read a lot of poetry.

[gatekeeper-watchman]

My Mission Objective:

I want you to know that I am just a man and they will never build a monument in my name.

Life is about establishing relationships called friendship and loving others. Every day of our lives we are given opportunities to show love and kindness to those around us. We must remember that those mortals we meet in parking lots, offices, elevators, the internet, and elsewhere are that portion of mankind God has given us to love and to serve. If we cannot regard those who are all around us as our family, we will never be capable of loving our neighbor or our enemy.

Gatekeeper-Watchman International Group is a Christian-based non-profit organization, that is a faith-based group of associates and friends from all over the world but is not limited to, environmental, social, advocacy, and human rights work. It is my passion that we all can work to promote social or political change on a broad scale or very locally. Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups (#GWIG) seek to play a critical part in developing society, improving communities, and promoting citizen participation all over the world through love, kindness, joy, and various forms of living support. As the founder and administrator of Gatekeeper- Watchman International Groups, my primary purpose is to defend or promote specific causes. As not opposed to operational project management, these organizational groups typically seek to raise awareness, acceptance, and knowledge by lobbying, press work, and activist events and are not limited to donations or outside financial support. Our mission is to accelerate and educate the community and world on the importance of why it's pivotal to empower men, women, and minorities in business globally. When the impoverished are elevated financially, communities, states, and countries prosper, this builds a global blueprint that will alleviate and eradicate poverty and redefine our common cause which is a fair and united democracy.

In this overcrowded online world, do you ever wonder why people spend most of their time googling? or sending a friend request without knowing you? I hope your experience with social networking has been good. And please let me introduce you to a fresh outlook on social platforms. In the beginning, I didn’t understand why people would read and share Posts, Blogs, Tweets, and or Comments when the web is awash with information, advice, and wisdom from people more experienced, more knowledgeable than myself.

As I have grown older, my need to search for quality friends, associates, and companions, immediately discovering that it wasn't easy to do. A relationship with intrinsic value and opportunity is also harder to mobilize because of our change in interests and environment. I have always preferred to choose my friends for myself rather than allowing others to do so for me and this is why I contact others that I may not know and that I find articulate, and exciting because we are communal beings.

I have learned that to introduce social and political change on a broad scale, I concluded that sharing, teaching, and discussing problems head-on and the topics of interest may allow us to focus on a particular subject, unlike the media which recklessly spits out more in shorter bytes than we have been able to chew on as a democracy.

In doing so, I have attempted to connect with people across the world. I constantly search for thriving groups of quality friends from many different cultures’ interests, and scopes of expertise. There, I placed open forums at specific locations and called them Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups. I have intended to ask for prayer, and discussion so that we may encourage others to change the way they gather and extrapolate information while focusing on different perspectives relating to education, employment, social advocacy, and human rights as "Information Specialists".

I believe that we all can work together to promote change on a broader scale. Likewise, we must all seek different means of sharing our experiences, knowledge, and faith on social platforms if we want to be less cluttered with better resolve.

I am also graciously seeking your support and participation in developing an all-volunteer movement. Your contributions and donations, I believe will support our mission to encourage, accelerate, and educate humanity on the importance of why it's pivotal to empower the less fortunate who have fallen between the cracks of bureaucracy globally. When the impoverished classes are elevated financially, communities, states, and countries prosper, and this builds a global blueprint that will alleviate and eradicate greed and selfishness that destroys economic growth and a lack of positive change.

Respectfully,

Wednesday, September 6, 2023

From: Steven P. Miller @ParkermillerQ,  gatekeeperwatchman.org Founder of Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups Wednesday, September 6, 2023, Jacksonville, Florida., Duval County, USA. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/Sparkermiller.JAX.FL.USA, https://www.facebook.com/StevenParkerMillerQ Instagram: steven_parker_miller_1956, Twitter: @GatekeeperWatchman1, @ParkermillerQ, https://twitter.com/StevenPMiller6 Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/gatekeeperwatchman, https://www.tumblr.com/gatekeeper-watchman, https://www.pinterest.com/GatekeeperWatchman1/ #GWIG, #GWIN, #GWINGO, #Ephraim1, #IAM, #Sparkermiller, #Eldermiller1981

[gatekeeperwatchman]

My Mission Objective:

I want you to know that I am just a man and they will never build a monument in my name.

Life is about establishing relationships called friendship and loving others. Every day of our lives we are given opportunities to show love and kindness to those around us. We must remember that those mortals we meet in parking lots, offices, elevators, the internet, and elsewhere are that portion of mankind God has given us to love and to serve. If we cannot regard those who are all around us as our family, we will never be capable of loving our neighbor or our enemy.

Gatekeeper-Watchman International Group is a Christain based non-profit organization, that is a faith-based group of associates and friends from all over the world but is not limited to, environmental, social, advocacy, and human rights work. It is my passion that we all can work to promote social or political change on a broad scale or very locally. Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups (#GWIG) seek to play a critical part in developing society, improving communities, and promoting citizen participation all over the world through love, kindness, joy, and various forms of living support. As the founder and administrator of Gatekeeper- Watchman International Groups, my primary purpose is to defend or promote specific causes. As not opposed to operational project management, these organizational groups typically seek to raise awareness, acceptance, and knowledge by lobbying, press work, and activist events and are not limited to donations or outside financial support. Our mission is to accelerate and educate the community and world on the importance of why it's pivotal to empower men, women, and minorities in business globally. When the impoverished are elevated financially, communities, states, and countries prosper, this builds a global blueprint that will alleviate and eradicate poverty and redefine our common cause which is a fair and united democracy.

In this overcrowded online world, do you ever wonder why people spend most of their time googling? or sending a friend request without knowing you? I hope your experience with social networking has been good. And please let me introduce you to a fresh outlook on social platforms. In the beginning, I didn’t understand why people would read and share Posts, Blogs, Tweets, and or Comments when the web is awash with information, advice, and wisdom from people more experienced, more knowledgeable than myself.

As I have grown older, my need to search for quality friends, associates, and companions, immediately discovering that it wasn't easy to do. A relationship with intrinsic value and opportunity is also harder to mobilize because of our change in interests and environment. I have always preferred to choose my friends for myself rather than allowing others to do so for me and this is why I contact others that I may not know and that I find articulate, and exciting because we are communal beings.

I have learned that to introduce social and political change on a broad scale, I concluded that sharing, teaching, and discussing problems head-on and the topics of interest may allow us to focus on a particular subject, unlike the media which recklessly spits out more in shorter bytes than we have been able to chew on as a democracy.

In doing so, I have attempted to connect with people across the world. I constantly search for thriving groups of quality friends from many different cultures interests, and scopes of expertise. There, I placed open forums at specific locations and called them Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups. I have intended to ask for prayer, and discussion so that we may encourage others to change the way they gather and extrapolate information while focusing on different perspectives relating to education, employment, social advocacy, and human rights as "Information Specialists".

I believe that we all can work together at promoting change on a broader scale. Likewise, we must all seek different means of sharing our experiences, knowledge, and faith on social platforms if we want to be less cluttered with better resolve.

I am also graciously seeking your support and participation in developing an all-volunteer movement. Your contributions and donations, I believe will support our mission to encourage, accelerate and educate humanity on the importance of why it's pivotal to empower the less fortunate who have fallen between the cracks of bureaucracy globally. When the impoverished classes are elevated financially, communities, states, and countries prosper, and this builds a global blueprint that will alleviate and eradicate greed and selfishness that destroys economic growth and a lack of positive change.

Respectfully,

Steven P. Miller

From: Steven P. Miller @ParkermillerQ, Founder of Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups Jacksonville, Florida., Duval County, USA. Instagram: steven_parker_miller_1956, Twitter: @GatekeeperWatchman1, @ParkermillerQ, https://twitter.com/StevenPMiller6 Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/gatekeeperwatchman URL: linkedin.com/in/steven-miller-b1ab21259 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ElderStevenMiller; GWIG, #GWIN, #GWINGO, #Ephraim1, #IAM, #Sparkermiller,#Eldermiller1981, facebook.com/ElderStevenMiller

[seniorvibes2024]

The Power of Your Vote: A Single Parent's Guide to Making a Difference

As a single parent juggling countless responsibilities, from managing household chores to attending to your children's needs, the idea of adding one more task to your plate may seem overwhelming. Voting, however, is not just another chore—it's a powerful tool that can shape the future for you and your children. In this blog post, we'll explore why voting matters, even for the busiest of single parents.

Firstly, let's address the common misconception that individual votes don't make a difference. While it's true that a single vote may not swing a national election, collective voting power absolutely does. Every vote contributes to the overall outcome, and in local elections especially, your vote can carry significant weight. From school board decisions to city council policies, these choices directly impact your family's daily life.

Moreover, voting is not merely about choosing a candidate; it's about advocating for the issues that matter most to you and your children. As a single parent, you understand firsthand the challenges faced by families like yours—access to affordable childcare, quality education, healthcare, and support systems are crucial. By voting, you have the opportunity to support candidates who align with your values and will champion policies that benefit single-parent households.

Consider the long-term implications of your vote. Elected officials make decisions that shape the trajectory of your community and your children's futures. By participating in the electoral process, you can help shape a society that prioritizes equity, opportunity, and support for all families, including yours.

But what about the time constraints of being a single parent? It's true that finding time to research candidates and cast your vote can be challenging. However, there are several strategies to make the process more manageable:

Plan Ahead: Utilize resources such as voter guides or online platforms that provide information on candidates and their platforms. Set aside dedicated time to review this information, perhaps during your children's nap time or after they've gone to bed.

Vote by Mail or Early: Many states offer options for voting by mail or early voting, allowing you to cast your ballot at a time that's convenient for you. Take advantage of these options to avoid the hassle of long lines on Election Day.

Get Your Children Involved: Use voting as a teachable moment for your children. Discuss the importance of civic engagement and take them with you when you vote. Not only does this instill valuable lessons about democracy, but it also demonstrates the importance of participating in the electoral process.

Prioritize Issues: Focus on the issues that directly impact your family and prioritize candidates who address these concerns. By narrowing your focus, you can streamline the decision-making process and make voting more manageable.

Ultimately, voting is an investment in your family's future. By taking the time to cast your ballot, you are advocating for positive change and ensuring that your voice is heard in the decision-making process. As a single parent, your perspective is invaluable, and your vote can make a meaningful difference in shaping policies that support families like yours.

In conclusion, while the demands of single parenthood may be daunting, voting is a responsibility that should not be overlooked. By participating in the electoral process, you have the power to influence change, advocate for your family's needs, and shape a brighter future for yourself and your children. So, next time an election rolls around, remember the importance of your vote and the impact it can have on your family and your community.

Please vote this year.

Thank you!

Seniorvibes2024

[iwritesins15]

tag game!

thank you for tagging me @bleedingastigmatism and @castieldean <3 <3 <3

rules: answer 30 questions and tag 20 blogs you are contractually obligated to get to know better

name: flora. you can also call me flor :)

star signs: aquarius sun, pisces moon, sagittarius rising

height: 5’2’’ / 158cm [yes, tiny]

time: 14:15

birthday: february 14

favorite bands: you can't do this to me!!! i like too many things 😥 emm MCR, FOB, Green Day, Keane, Led Zepp, Mother mother, Metallica, Florence + the machine. From my country: Divididos, Eruca Sativa, Carajo, Miranda. + a millon of solo artists ! god i'm probably forgetting so many ahdasjdk

last movie: thor love & thunder

last show: what we do in the shadows, supernatural or the boys, i don't remember... i watched them around the same time last week or so and i can't remember what happened when asjdahsdja

when i created this blog: uuh wait... july 2015. I had another blog but when i wanted to change fandoms i created this one and i don't remember the other one

what i post: i'm a multifandom blog but right now i'm fixated on spn so... mainly spn. i try to make edits when i can but it's a very sporadic thing

last thing i googled: "museos"

other blogs: nope, this is what i am, like it or not

do i get asks?: almost never but if anyone wants to, DO IT!! i have anon on too!

following: 452

average hours of sleep: uuhh... 4hs min - 9hs max

instruments: guitar but EXTREMELY basic stuff

what i'm wearing: pijamas

dream job: professor and academic researcher

dream trip: honestly i would like to know my entire country (argentina), but i would also really like to see australia, new zealand, scotland, greece, egypt. idk the entire world tbh

nationality: argentinian 🧉

favorite songs: no, you literally can't do this to me i have songs i fixate but i don't think i have a fave one. I can tell u i'm currently fixated in "heaven can wait" by MJ, "Fumar de día" by Marilina Bertoldi, "The foundations of decay" by MCR and "Cabildo y juramento" by Conociendo Rusia

last book i've read: "Setting the people free: The story of democracy" by John Dunn but besides uni stuff?? "The Picture of Dorian Gray" by Oscar Wilde

top 3 fictional universes id like to live in: pokemon ? maybe ??? idk i never thought about this ahdasdjasdhjd

tags! please do it just if you want to, don't feel pressured! @pleaseraisemefromperdition @afterspaced @kellyscabin @sarahjacobs @anna-coded @wigglebox @chaoticdean @ensigneckles @chapeldean

[writing-in-april]

My Date with the President’s Daughter

Spencer Reid x Female Reader (Spencer POV)

Summary: Spencer has a date with the President’s daughter, who he’s been dating for a while in partial secret. He hasn’t seen her in person for a while so he’s had to settle for another form of communication.

A/N: Ok just to get this out of the way— this is not a politically charged fic, I don’t express my own political beliefs in this fic nor do I express my opinion on the beliefs of others. The president in this fic is entirely made up and I just thought it would be cool to release it on Inauguration Day like the nerd I am. I do not want a political debate in the comments, this blog is not meant for that. This fic is for fun and to make people a little happier in these trying times. Please respect my wishes. This was a really fun way to write a twist on Spencer dating someone famous and- I wonder if anyone can spot the West Wing reference I used 🤔Thanks to @spencers-dria again for always helping me out with my fics 🥰This is also apart of my unlinked fic series called Spencer Reid & Letters! Requests are open and thank you for reading!

Warning: Vague political talk, References to keeping their relationship secret earlier, Avoiding the paparazzi- that should be it.

Main Masterlist Spencer Reid & Letters Word count: 1.6k

She didn’t have to put her short little letter to me on the back of a postcard, but she always did it this way. I remember when she first told me why she did it. We were sitting cuddled up on my couch at the early start of our relationship. I had asked her why she always insisted she send her letters on the back of a tiny card, she would’ve had so much more room if she got out a piece of paper.

She said she got into the habit of sending them to her father whenever he was away on business. Her handwriting had been horrible as a child according to her and her father had suggested she try to fit all of her thoughts onto a postcard. So, now she sent all of her letters neatly handwritten with the smallest of letters, so small you could almost barely read them, on the back of a postcard.

The postcard I had gotten late today, delivered by one of the last people on duty this late at night, was a picturesque view of the White House. The grass bright green and the outside covered in pure crisp white, a statuesque image of American democracy. Now, she didn’t send this to me because she wanted to express her political views and patriotism in a postcard, it just so happened to be where her father lived.

The fact that she was the President’s daughter used to intimidate me a lot when I first met her. I hadn’t immediately connected the dots in my head that she was the first daughter when we first met, though I could tell I had seen her somewhere before. Though, my first assumption was that maybe she had been a regular at my favorite coffee shop, not the daughter to the President of the United States. Literally my biggest boss.

First time I met him was also my first time in the east wing; she had some help from her secret service detail to sneak me in through the back. I only ever nervously stutter when I’m in intimidating or stressful situations and I’m pretty sure I barely got a sentence out the first ten minutes after I had met him. Luckily, he did seem to like me, though I’m not really sure why. Y/N told me once it was because he found my intelligence extraordinary and my constant willingness to share facts endearing. I always blush when I remember that, she was always so sweet to me and the fact that her family loved me as well caused my heart to swell exponentially. I stared at the captured view for a few seconds longer before the dots had fully connected in my head, I may have an eidetic memory, but sometimes it took me a minute to get her subtle hints. She didn’t actually live at the White House, she had her own house in D.C. But, this postcard meant one thing. She’s home.

Each postcard she sent me had a picture of wherever she was while she was traveling the world, it was a small gesture that made me feel closer to her, I always tried to imagine I was there with her at every location she sent. She had been out of the country for at least a month on business and even before that we hadn’t seen each other for a while, I had been stuck on a long case that kept me away from her for half a month.

A month and a half, that’s how long it's been since I’ve had her in my arms. I turned over the card expecting to see it filled with more words than most people would think could fit on the back of a postcard to let me know when I could see her, but this was not the case. Instead, the back of the card contained less words than normal. Only the words- meet me at 10pm at our usual spot.

My body moved faster than my brain, getting up to pack up all my things to rush to our usual spot. My watch sat over my cardigan sleeve on my wrist and it blinked up at me letting me know I only had 30 minutes till I had to get to the other side of town.I still had some paperwork left, but enough that I could push it off till the next day. Once I had gotten all my stuff together I scurried over to leave through the glass doors.

“Are you heading home, Spence?” A voice from inside the bullpen called out startling me out of my thoughts, I had thought everyone had left for the night. I turned around to look at the owner of the voice, JJ, who had come back from the break room to finish her large stack of paperwork that still remained.

“Actually no- I have a date.” A small shy smile made its way onto my face, I still felt very shy when I talked about my relationship with the team. When I had first told them after around 8 months into our relationship, they had thought I was pulling their legs. Once they did realize that I was in fact, not bullshitting them as Morgan had suspected, the questions had immediately come down on me. The ogling at my relationship never really ceased in the months after it had come out to the team, and the rest of the world. We mostly still tried to keep it under wraps, but the fact that the press now knew about me after some photos got leaked from a date only made the team ogle even more.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to who you go on dates with, it’s like something out of a movie.” JJ joked, then yawning again and leaning her face into her palms. “Well- I still have a lot of paperwork to do, you go enjoy your night, Spencer. I know you haven’t seen her in a while.”

My mind had already begun to shift away from JJ as soon as she brought her up, I was practically vibrating in anticipation, I couldn’t wait to see her.

—-

The rare book store on the east side of Quantico had been my favorite for years, ever since I had moved out here from Vegas actually. So much so that the owners, an older couple named Margaret and Dan, both knew me by name and knew almost exactly what books I wanted every time. The both of them had immediately jumped at the chance when I had hesitantly asked them to let the both of us meet up here, I had been desperately trying to find a place outside of my apartment where we could meet up.

When I entered the shop through the back it was already deserted just for us, she must have contacted Maggie and Dan to ask them if we could have the store for the night. The store was packed full of the rare books the owners had both acquired over the years, ranging from old tales and poems written by Edgar Allan Poe, the dark brother’s Grimm tales, to almost any old book that you could think of. It was almost to the point where I thought maybe Maggie and Dan should upgrade to a bigger shop.

“Long time no see.” A voice piped up from the mostly dark corner where she sat in a dark green armchair only partially illuminated by a standing lamp. Broad grins broke out on both of our faces before we both ran to each other, engulfing ourselves into an overwhelming bear hug.

“I missed you so much you don't even know.” Tears prickled at the edge of my eyes, though I wasn’t afraid to admit that us being apart for so long made me tear up.

“I've got a pretty good idea, I missed you so much as well.” She sniffed and then sighed into the crook of my neck. I moved my hand up to cradle her head to try and bring her as close as possible to me, even though there was already not even an inch of space between the two of us.

A nagging thought was dancing around in my brain, the card was so short and abrupt. It wasn’t like her to not be long winded whenever she wrote to me, she even had a tendency to be worse than I was sometimes.

“Why was the card so short? You feeling ok?”

“I just couldn’t wait to see you… It’s been so long since I’ve seen you...” Her tone of voice made me sad, it had been so lonely for me as well when we were apart.  “I never want to be away from you for that long ever again.”

“Move in with me.” The words blurted out of my mouth before I could really think about my words. I didn’t care whether it would be feasible or not, I just knew I never wanted us to be apart for so long ever again.

“Well-“ I cringed a little at her words sensing a rejection, I worried that I had just screwed it all up by asking. However, again she surprised me, “We might need to get a new place to settle my father’s worries about security.”

I breathed out a breathy laugh of relief at her words, enveloping her into a bruising kiss, my worry and anxiety immediately melting away. I couldn’t wait for the next chapter of my life with the President’s daughter.

—-

Tag list (Message me if you want to be added):

All works: @shotarosleftpinky

Spencer Reid/CM:

@calm-and-doctor @destiny-tsukino @safertokiss

Spencer Reid & Letters Series:

@sierraraeck @90spumkin @whoreforthebau

[mimik-u]

“Homeworld Bound” Thoughts:

I wasn’t going to watch this one today, but then I realized that I really missed the Diamonds and wanted to consume novel content, so!

OOH, good on the show for taking us directly to the aftermath of “Fragments” instead of putting space between the episodes. That’s just... a really good choice narrative wise.

Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl’s expressions are so distressing here. He’s been gone for three days; they must’ve been so worried.

Jasper steps aside to reveal an absolutely ruined Steven.

He just technically killed a gem and then resurrected her. How intensely will that forever lie on his psyche? Oh my g od

NO, NOT JASPER PASSIVELY MAKING THE DIAMOND SIGN IN THE BACKGROUND AUGH

“You can’t just disappear for days without telling us!”

Steven silent walking up to the Observatory as the Gems continue to freak the fuck out is harrowing. And Dee Dee Magno Hall is killing it with her voice acting here. The simultaneous fear and anger and horror in her voice. Oh my g d

“You guys... I love you, but you can’t help me anymore. I’ve been avoiding the only people in the entire universe who can.” 🥺 This is sad, but I’m also, like, problematic grandmas time!!!!!

“Find something better to do with your life.” God, Jasper’s look of disbelief and sadness here. I didn’t really delve into this during my “Fragments” watch because I was just roridoodwrjfkrkeke reeling, but her reaction to being accidentally shattered is psychologically devastating???? I’d wager that she simultaneously respects the fact that she’s been subjugated by a being more powerful than her, that she’s grateful to Steven for being both subjugator and savior, and likely, she’s conflating this new loyalty with her former loyalty for Pink. This is a really complex psyche (a tragic one most of all).

Garnet: “Steven, remember, we’ll always be your family.” I’m so fucki n emo

AWHWHWH, HOMEWORLD IS SO BRIGHT AND COLORFUL NOW!!!

YO!! Homeworld has a democracy now!! The Zircons!!!!!!!

THE WALL GEM IS MOVING??????? KWOEOEIDJDKSJS

Can u imagine being a wall cursed with sentience. that is so funny on so many levels

But it’s also really interesting, too. If the Wall Gem is a gem in the way say Topazes are gems, which, judging by her mobility, she is—then her explicit purpose in Era 1-2, as molded by presumably Yellow, was to b a wall omg. (Or, arguably, I think it can be argued that the inanimate object Gems, like Comby, were probably accidental sentient creations, made in relationship to their proximity to the Diamonds during their various secretion rituals!!)

Anyway, I love thinking about Homeworld worldbuilding. It’s fascinating.

SQUARE PERIDOT

SPIIIIIINELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!

Her heart eyes!! She looks so happy!

Steven, angry af: “Spinel, what is wrong with you?” / Spinel: Oh, you know—the usual.” KEKDSKDK

Also, Steven really wanted to say fuck there. NEKDDKKSSKKS

“I was such a wreck then, but I am so much better now.” We stan character growth 😭😭

One thing I have loved the Crewniverse so much for doing is never taking away the physical signs of gems’ mental distress, even after they’ve gotten better: Blue’s eye bags, Volleyball’s eye, Spinel’s running mascara. That is so important.

YELLOW SITTING AT HER LIL VANITY!!

IT’S LIGHT INSIDE HER ROOM! THERE R FLOWERS! THRIVE, QUEEN, THRIVE.

YELLOW REVERSING HER GEM EXPERIMENTS OH MY G D

FUCKING QUEEN!!!!!!

(I’m sorry in advance. The rest of the live blog is just going to be screaming about the Diamonds.)

“I can permanently alter any physical form!” She’s so proud of herself. 😭😭😭 I fuckin’ love her.

Yellow laying down on the ground like that is SENDING ME SKSKSJSJ.

Ugh, and her being such a good mom to Spinel. I’m cry in f

“If anything’s out of proportion, it’s your temper. You can be big if you want to, or you can be small if you want to, but if you’re going to be upset no matter what, then this problem isn’t physical—it’s emotional. Go see Blue.”

I really like her advice here because it’s advice that comments so clearly on her own character arc. At her lowest, she was quick to anger, aggressive, and temperamental, which she diagnoses in Steven here. Additionally, she was the Diamond who was concerned largely with physical actions. She coped by maintaining the Empire through conquering planets and maintaining the minutiae of leadership; she thought the only way to receive justice for Pink was through the physical act of destruction. And in doing so, she pushed her own emotions deep, deep down until they manifested in anger, aggressiveness, and temperamental outbursts. This hurt the people she cared about, and it hurt herself most of all.

Also, “Go see Blue. That is her department.” Ejdoiddjdjjsjdjdks, “go see ur other grandma.”

BLUE FLOATING ON A CLOUD!!!!!

“Your powers have been causing you dramatic mood swings? That seems awfully troubling Steven.” God I love her

“You don’t seem troubled.” This is a really interesting line because it comments on how Blue’s emotions, especially her negatively charged ones, used to be so visible all over her; indeed, she both wittingly and actively used to project them on other Gems, forcing them to feel her suffering, too.

OH, SHE GOES ON TO SAY THE EXACT SAME THING EOEODODISSJJS. LISTEN, I REALLY VIBE WITH BLUE.

“Back before you came into my life, Steven, I wanted every one to feel the pain I felt. I realized I must make up for my awful behavior by bringing joy to others.”

Another thing I’ve appreciated about the writing in this episode: So far, both Blue and Yellow have used the adjective awful to describe their former actions. It’s the self-awareness and the refusal to try to excuse themselves that powerfully shows how much they’ve grown. And it’s their continuous endeavors to keep moving forward, to help the Gems that they’ve hurt, that indicates that they’re willing to constantly keep growing and atoning.

NFOFOFDKSSKSKSK, THESE CLOUDS ARE JUST HER VAPORIZED TEARS HELP.

Sick vape clouds, Blue

I’VE HEARD THE SONG BEFORE, BUT EVERY TIME SHE SINGS, I LOSE MY SHI T

LISA HANNNNIGAAAAAAAN

This is such a pretty line: “Cold palace walls, and endless empty halls, haunted by echoes of laughter.”

BLUE ASCENDING THROUGH THE CLOUDS AUSHAHHSHD

BLUE MAKING HEART CLOUDS FOR SPINEL!!

BLUE CALLING SPINEL N STEVEN HER LITTLE REASONS WHY.

“I’LL NEVER MAKE YOU CRY.” This line is particularly lovely because I think it plays well with Steven’s line to her in “CYM:” “How many times did you make her cry?”

BDJDJDJSJDJ, BLUE LAYING ON HER CLOUD LIKE YELLOW LAID ON THE FLOOR.

The way she sings the last “loving you.” 😭😭😭😭 I’m gonna weep. I love her so fucking much.

“I found happiness. If that's not something you think you deserve, then I suspect this is an issue of self worth. I suggest you go to White for assistance with such matters.” 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 And like Yellow did, Blue gets to the heart of her arc cleanly.

Before Steven and before her own emotional reckoning, she didn’t think it was her place to be happy: “I know my purpose isn’t to be happy.” But in learning to love others, Blue has found true, inner happiness, which she literally shares with others. Wow.

And I think there’s something powerful in her distinction between true happiness and self-worth. You can’t find one without espousing the other.

White’s room is so pretty. 🥺

THE FLASHING STROBE LIGJTS DDNJDFJDJDNF.

SPINEL WHITE DIAMOND?!/!:$;8;83&:&:

SHE FUCKING LETS OTHER GEMS CONTROL HE R HELP.

SPINEL MAKING WHITE TAP DANCE FICODODOFODJDNDJSJDJDJJDDJDJ

Steven’s horrified expression omg

“I’m scared I’m gonna hurt people; I guess I already have.” God.

And that’s another thing that this episode has called to mind. Blue, Yellow, and White alike once used their insane powers to hurt other Gems and to hurt themselves, and here, throughout this series, we see Steven discovering that same capacity for destruction and self-destruction. Along with the systematic oppressions they facilitated, a big part of the Diamonds’ modus operandi was that their powers were directly correlated to their mental states and their various inabilities to confront their own selves and effect inner change. The corrective wasn’t necessarily Steven; the corrective was him helping them to do that initial act of introspection and looking inwards. And so, too, will Steven have to do the same by the end of this series. But I presume that his family, all the people and gems who have loved and cared for him, will in effect be his Steven, just as he has always been for them.

“Half a Diamond, half a creature of Earth—in all the universe there's no one else that could know what you’re going through, so maybe it's time you talked to yourself.” This is so viscerally sad. White hits the nail on the head here. Steven’s human friends/family and his gem family and even the Diamonds, who come the closest to matching his own strength, can never fully understand him. It’s the tension that underscores a lot, if not the entire show.

White briefly touches Steven with her nail, and you can viscerally see the trauma on his face; he hasn’t forgotten her act above all, wrenching his gem out, nearly killing him.

“I’m... I’m a Diamond.” Steven, in looking at White Diamond, realizes that she’s a mirror of himself. Holy fucking shit

“I don’t want to be you! I don’t want to be anything like you!” HOLY FUCKING SHIT

“Don’t hurt me! She can’t hurt me! I’m controlling her...” And here, Steven doesn’t light upon the essential thing... in making White punch the wall, nearly knocking a huge rock into him, he’s the one hurting himself.

This show, oh my g o d

“She’s the one who should be afraid.” STEVEN?!!!!????!??!

“No, stop it! I don’t like this!” / “Please, you’re scaring me.” OH MY GO D

HE FUCKING MADE HER SLAM HER GEM AGAINST A PILLAR HOLY HE LL

“What... what was that?” Christine’s delivery here. Holy shit. 😭😭 And both of them are surrounded in the carnage of Steven’s wrath. Holy fucking shit.

This act is fundamentally different than him accidentally shattering Jasper in “Fragments”; this was an intentional attempt to hurt White, to crack her, to break her. Holy fucking shit

Spinel, Blue, and Yellow waiting for Steven outside of White’s door has my heart a little and a lot tender 🥺🥺🥺🥺

SPINEL SINGING I CAN MAKE A CHANGE SO DRAMATICALLY DJDIDJDJDJDJD. (But yeah, lmao, this will absolutely be the conclusion of Steven’s arc at the end of Future.)

“Steven! Let us help you, Steven!” The Diamonds are so concerned (mirroring the Gems back at home, too). 😭😭

He leaves a flip flop behind like Cinderella lmao

“Steven, let us help you!” / “We’re your family!” 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

And just as he implored the CGs, he tells the Diamonds not to follow him either.

Steven is completely and utterly alone.

Not by necessity.

But God, by choice.

Okay, this is my new favorite Future episode.

[srbachchan]

DAY 4542

Jalsa, Mumbai                   Aug 9,  2020                 Sun 11:43 AM

Expect the unexpected from the Ef ever .. 

and one such brightness evolves in this creativity which kind of reflects one of my posers in the Blog ..

🤣🤣🤣🤣

Dear Mr. Amitabh Bachchan,

Re: Your Application for an alternate job vide Day 4539

In view of the permanent kind of temporary moratorium on work imposed on you by the governance due to your age, and the loss of revenue caused by the same, we are pleased to inform you that your application for an alternate job is temporarily under review for permanent reasons...

(By the way, before we forget, please register our request that if you understand anything of what we are saying, please let us know too...)

---

Long ago, when we were growing at a rapid rate - when half pants became a quarter in less than half the time - everything was temporary...

Studying was temporary, games were temporary,

Crying was temporary, annoyance was temporary,

Time was temporary...

We lived in the temporary...

Today, there are signboards at each post, saying the same thing -

‘We are temporarily closed due to Corona’

As if we didn’t know…

---

But what they don’t say when they are in business is that -

‘We are temporarily open due to good times...’

Which, I guess, is a fact that is taken for granted...

I realized this during the long power outage last week during the gale and thunder storm… Food, electricity, drinking water, air, sunlight etc.... everything is here for the moment...

Nothing is near, nothing is far, everything is temporary...

---

So, here is our offer -  

Sir,

if you wish to do nothing, yet you want to feel as if you are something, then we suggest that you become the President of the United States...

But if you want to do something which will last forever, then we suggest that you open a Peace Shop... Sell Peace... that shop can never go out of business...

Let us draft a flowchart for you to prepare for the venture...

1) Vision - To provide a rolling plan for ways and means to acquire and sustain peace...

2) Mission - Make sure that it remains a rolling plan... Peace alive is peace dead...

3) Amis and Objectives - Define Peace, develop immeasurable standards for peace, and draft governance models for ensuring that the standards are impossible to achieve...

4) Policies - Develop and enforce codes of conduct which will make the objectives happen...

5) Systems - Draft and build an organisation of functions which are both horizontally and vertically indefinite... Make sure that everything and everyone is included...

6) Procedures - Develop and establish procedures for each function such that no single procedure is standalone... every procedure must rely on another to produce results...

7) Standards - Establish standards for each procedure... Make sure that the standards are not auditable... we live in a democracy... Use the preamble to beat audits...

8) Codes of Practice - Adopt all new codes of practice... Remember, history is recorded for telling us what has been defeated in the past... Historical successes are compromised...

---

We sincerely hope that you will lead our temporary enterprise... We will wrap it up as soon as it shows signs of positive results...

Looking forward to your favourable response, and assuring you of our best services at all times,

We remain,

Yours truly,

Sd/-

🤣🤣🤣

my job is now insured .. 

Amitabh Bachchan

[demivampirew]

The American

Napoleon Solo x OFC (Carmen Martínez)

Triggers: talking about coup d'état (no descriptions of violence, though), talking about sex (no descriptions/ no smut); the death of a friend.

A/N: I talked a bit about the Argentinian history. I think I did a decent job with what I remember from one of my classes from college 😁 There’s some Spanish, but everything is translated, so don’t worry if you don’t speak Spanish.

You can find more of my writings in the Masterlist

Tag list: @lunedelorient @henrythickcavill @wolvesandhoundshowltogether @mary-ann84 @desperate-and-broken @peakygroupie @summersong69 @ivvitm1109 @madbaddic7ed @iloveyouyen @the-soot-sprite @hell1129-blog @whyyoudothistomecavill @thetaoofzoe​ @thereisa8ella​ @darkbooksarwin

Date: March, 1962

Place: Buenos Aires, Argentina.

The handsome man smiled at the waitress when she brought the black coffee he requested moments before.

“Muchísimas gracias, señorita.” (Thank you so much, miss) he said with a big smile on his face. 

“No tiene nada que agradecer, señor. Por favor, hágame saber si necesita otra cosa.” (No need to thank me, sir. Please let me know if you need anything else) she replied very politely.

“De hecho, hay algo más que necesitaría que haga por mi.” (In fact, there’s something else I would need you to do for me) he prompted as a devilishly smirk appeared on his face. “¿Podría darme su número telefónico?” (Could you give me your phone number?) he finished asking and the young woman got really nervous.

“She can’t give you her number, she’s married to the asshole looking at you from inside the Coffee place and he’s going to beat her if he finds out you’re flirting with her.” The man heard a female voice explained and he looked to the other table placed on the outside of the store and there was a woman in her late twenties/ early thirties sitting there, drinking coffee. This woman gave a slight nod to the waitress and she smiled at her and the gentleman and ran back inside.

He looked at his coffee for a second, lost in his thoughts and then grabbed the cup and went to sit next to the lady. She rolled her eyes but said nothing. There was a minute of silence in which the handsome stranger took a sip of his hot beverage and then he spoke:

“How did you know that I spoke English?” he asked, amused and curious.

“Being an American, I would be surprised if you didn’t,” she replied while she continued to read the newspaper she had on her hands.

“And how did you arrive to the conclusion that I’m an American?” 

“Two things: A) your clothing. You’re wearing a suit and the fabric is quite expensive. Here, with the economic state of the country, only extremely rich men could afford a suit like that. B) Earlier, when you got here you saw two foreigners argue in English and you said to the waitress “ja, americanos” (Ha, Americans) while laughing at their behaviour.

“And how is that proof that I’m American?” he questioned while raising an eyebrow. 

The woman looked at him smirking, very amused by the situation.

“You would never hear a local call someone from the United States Americano (American)” she stated.

“Why not?” he was surprised and confused.

“Because we’re taught in school that America is a continent, not a country. So for us you are Americans, but so are we, because we live in the American continent, darling,” she explained.

“Hu, I didn’t see that coming” he replied amused by the new information he learned and her deductive skills. She could easily be a spy if she wanted to.

“Jack Deveny” he said as extended his hand.

“Carmen Martínez” she replied while shaking his hand.

“What a pretty name.” 

“Thanks, yours is very pretty too, Mr. Solo” she said in a soft voice, making sure no one heard her say that name. 

Napoleon froze. His eyes were wide open. How did she know that name?  What else did she know about him? Not very often it would happen, something that would catch him by surprise.

“H-how…” he started asking but she interrupted him.

“I constantly check the list of people coming to this country and their backgrounds.” she began to explain “I saw that a man by the name of Jack Deveny was coming to the country for vacation purposes and it caught my attention. You’ll see, “Mr. Deveny”, we haven’t had many American visitors in the last couple of years due to our tense political climate. Only people dealing with business or political related issues to attend would come to Argentina. So, whenever I see someone from the United States or Europe coming here, I follow them to see what they’re up to.”

“And what am I up to, Mrs. Martínez? Is that even your real name?” he asked and she smirked.

“Your orders were to find out if the rumours about Fidel Castro coming once more to Argentina to talk to the President were true; that’s what the papers you left on your hotel room said. You know, for a spy you’re terrible at hiding important documents. I would work on fixing that, sir.” she shrugged and giggled. “And believe it or not, yes, that’s my real name.”

“Hu. You criticized me for not hiding my secret and you’re out there giving away your real name,” he said amused and, to be honest, a bit offended.

“That’s because I’m here to have an honest conversation with you and I think for that to happen there should be no covers here.”

“What do you want to talk about?” 

“Your boss is fucking you,” she said, lowering her voice.

“Pardon me?” 

“They lied to you. They send you here not to spy on Castro, because they know he’s not coming here any time soon, but because they know a coup d'état is about to happen and they want someone from their team to witness it and to find out who’s going to take charge after President Frondizi is forced to resign and how that will affect your country.” she explained to him. “And I say they’re fucking you because they made you believe this was an easy mission but they did not inform you properly about the political and social state were currently living.”

“Ok. Would you care to do what they failed to do?” he requested.

“What do you know about my country's politics?”

“Not much, to be honest. I know your president has tried to keep a good relationship with America but he also supported the Cuban Revolution, which tensed up a bit the relationship with my country.” Napoleon replied.

“Well, trying to play both teams it’s something he not only did with the USA and Cuba. What do you know about former president Perón?” Carmen inquired.

“Military man. Help create the syndicates. Big, big following.” 

“He has a big, big group of enemies as well.” the woman told him. “The social politics that he applied while in office made a lot of people who saw themselves affected by his rulings hate him and do everything in their power to move him for his charge. He helped with the creation of syndicates and other groups that fought for the rights of workers, but some of the leaders of those groups became powerful men that had their own following and some anarchist groups were born. Those groups were extremely protective of Perón and his politics and would even go violent if they felt they needed to protect those beliefs. After he was forced to resign a year before he could finish his second term, a decree was passed that forced syndicates to cease activities and practice any worship of Perón and his politics.” she paused for a moment and continued, “When Frondizi was campaigning for the presidency after democracy was once again installed, he made a no so secret pact with the former president, promising him that if he convinced his followers to vote for him, he would reinstall syndicate activities and the practice of his political beliefs. The thing is that Perón kept his part of the deal but the president did not. He did allow syndicates to resume activities, but the ban against him continued. And later on, his support for the Cuban Revolution really put the conservative military leaders against him. His constant desire to have the support of both sides made him lose all his allies. As far as I know, in a few weeks or maybe just days, the military is going to take charge once more.” she finished and sighed.

“I’m sorry,” said Napoleon. He could feel her distress.

“You need to leave, Solo, before things get dangerous. And nor the rebels or the military like people from your country,” she warned him.

 Carmen took some money from her purse and put it under the cup’s plate. She stood up and walked away. Napoleon followed her with his eyes until he saw her disappear.

 For the next few days, Napoleon tried hard to find things about her but he couldn’t. She told him that was her real name but he started to have doubts about it. But she was right about the nature of his mission: after their encounter, he talked to his boss and he admitted that he was there as a witness and to collect information about the political state of the country. She was right about the hate of people like him, the rich-looking Americans. He got his ass kicked by a group of anarchists -he could have protected himself, but he tried to keep the appearances up so showing his fighting abilities wasn’t the smart thing to do, he would have given himself up. 

 The coup d'état happened two weeks after their encounter, on March 28th. Napoleon was already back in America at that time. He was supposed to stay longer, but he made the mistake of taking a married woman to bed and his husband was a high ranked officer on the military who threatened to kill him if he didn’t get out of the country. Solo wasn’t the kind of agent that failed on his missions so this was a first for him, or at least that’s what he thought. Thanks to a folder he found among his work archives, that contained all the information about the previous government and the military group that was going to take charge, he was able to leave with his reputation intact and nobody found out about his mistake.

Now he was safe back at his house, resting before his next mission was assigned, but he couldn’t stop thinking about her, Carmen: Was she safe? Would he ever see her again? He thought that was improbable, but he wished he could see her at least one more time; he needed the change to thank her for the folder.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After the success of the first mission of his new team U.N.C.L.E, Napoleon decided to take a much-deserved break. He went to Saint-Tropez hoping to meet some beautiful women, have some drinks, party and relax.

The sun was shining bright. Solo grabbed two cold drinks and walked towards a woman who was laying on the beach all by herself.

“I hope you put on sunscreen lotion, don’t want to burn that beautiful skin of yours,” he said with a smooth voice while looking at the sun. “Drin…” he turned to look at her, offering the glass on his hand when he abruptly stopped, surprised by what his eyes were seeing.

It was her.

“Carmen.” he said, almost whispering.

“Hello, Napoleon. It’s nice to see you again.” she greeted him and accepted the drink he brought her.

“Are you still following me?” he asked, smiling and raising an eyebrow.

“Ha! You wished” she replied laughing, amused.

Napoleon joined her laugh and sat next to her. They shared a moment of silence, enjoying the view and the noises provided by the water dancing around and some birds singing. 

“I’m glad to see that you’re ok,” he said, breaking the silence.

“Me too. I’m glad to see that you’re still in one piece, American” Carmen added and made him laugh.

“How’s everything in your country? I’ve heard that you got a new president...Arturo something.”

“Illia. Yes. Humble and trustworthy guy. Most people like him, the military not so much; he’s too liberal for their taste.” she explained. There was a bit of bitterness on her voice.

“You think there’s going to be another coup d'état?” he asked, worried.

She was looking at the sun. She nodded and sighed.

“That’s why I left. I didn’t work for the government. I belonged to a group of men and women who worked from the shadows trying to help the country. We didn’t follow any particular political view, we just wanted to create a country with freedom of speech, with equal rights for everyone and where no one had to be afraid, but that’s hard to achieve. One of our men died and everyone got scared. Most of the members of our secret society fled to other countries, seeking asylum before their families got hurt. Me, I wanted to keep going, but I couldn’t do that alone, so I moved to the States and joined a group of strong women who are fighting for equality. I think there I could be really helpful.” she finished.

They looked at each other for a moment. Napoleon smiled at her and they remained in silence, enjoying the beautiful view. 

 After about twenty minutes of silence, the handsome man spoke once more.

“I never got the chance to thank you for helping me; you truly saved me.”

“You’re welcome. I hope that taught you a lesson about the downside of being a womanizer.

“ she said and he shrugged. Carmen rolled her eyes as she smiled.

“Would you like to have dinner with me tonight?” Napoleon asked suddenly.

“You’re not getting into my pants, mister? she replied.

“What about your heart?” he prompted, smirking. She couldn’t help herself but smile. No one can resist his charm.

[chemicalarospec]

Nearly four years ago today, on November 8th, 2016, I was playing iCivics games on my family’s old black Dell Windows 7 laptop, now defunct, while the election results rolled in on television. There was an air of celebration in our living room with the first female president of the United States on the horizon.

The night went on. The results kept coming. I played all the games on iCivics. I was getting tired. Things weren’t called yet, but I couldn’t stay up much longer.

I went to bed on November 8th 2016, facing a bright future, a progressive future. The future I dreamed of and wished for and seemed right, right to be, right to be now.

Nearly four years ago today, on November 9th, 2016, I woke up. “Trump won,” my dad told me, standing outside my bedroom door. “He won the election.” It was too early to process; I was still in the groggy state where nothing feels real. Clinton winning had been too good to be true. I wasn’t shocked, but I rarely have strong surprise reactions.

I lost my faith in adults, in people, in my own government far too young. My father said that the average person is stupider than you think they are. My maternal grandfather said he lost his faith in democracy, seeing how it worked out here and across the world, especially his native Taiwan. My paternal grandmother said, “I used to think that you can can believe whatever you want, so long as it doesn’t hurt me or anyone I care about -- so long as it doesn’t hurt anyone, really. Now I’m not sure about that.” I still think about that.

I lost my faith far too young. My faith in everything.

Children think adults are superheros with all the answers. They think, or at least children in places like me, think the government is a warm maternal figure, caring for us as we care for it in return. The government will change as society changes, and of course society is changing. Of course society is going where your parents want it to. Of course the world is kind to people it should be kind to.

Society works because everybody puts in their part, and of course, of course, everybody puts in their part.

Surely everybody puts in their part?

Surely everybody cares?

I don’t like saying much about my age, but for a vague guide, I wasn’t wearing real bras when my worldview was shattered, and I wouldn’t for a while longer.

I didn’t get to have a slow realization while growing up and entering the world. I didn’t get to gain an understanding of the bubble I lived in and my childish naiveté. Instead, the world banged on my door and thrust the truth into my face, yelling, “Fvck you. Fvck you and your dreams and people like you and everything you want from your childhood and your time now. The world is a dirty, disgusting place and we don’t want to change. There are systems of power and they will never give you what you deserve.”

It wasn’t just the election, not really. Mainly through reading Tumblr blogs, I learned that the systems are rigged and nobody cares because the laws are rigged. I started reading TIME magazine around the same time and was exposed to the #metoo movement. Flint’s water crisis loomed large at that time. The Pulse nightclub shooting. I still remember the cover for that one: every name and age in a column of red text, annotated only by a question -- “Why did they die?”

They insist atheists like me are amoral. They refuse to make space for mixed-race people like me. They alienate Asians like me, and especially now, with COVID-19, they taunt people like me and they yell slurs at people like me and they beat people like me up. They kill queer kids like me, bully us far past the point of inhumanity. They steal the bodies of girls like me. They shoot youths like me up.

They are so much worse to others and it makes my heart ache. I support and elevate those who have it worse than me, but I never forget that I am not a “perfect” person either, not in the eyes of normality -- the collective experiences of my identities weigh upon me even when I do not experience direct discrimination. Too many people deserve so much more -- too much -- than what the world resigns to allow them.

The year is 2020. The world has changed. I have changed. It is November 3, and I am sitting on the other side of my family’s couch. The election results are slowly, slowly beginning to roll in. Instead of slivers of progress, they look like stats in a sick game where my well-being and others’ lives are the stakes. I am making a Tumblr post, with plans to bake cupcakes for my mom when I’m done.

And, of course, play iCivics games on my school-issued white MacBook Air late into the night. 

What did we learn from this, children? What moral or message do we take from this story of pain, betrayal, and slim, bleak hope? Why did I want to share this tale?

You tell me. I have cupcakes to make.

(No I genuinely don’t know please tell me.)

[theculturedmarxist]

Decolonization is not a metaphor

Kind of sucks for a lot of reasons, many of which I think are illustrated in their section about Occupy Oakland. (pg 25, 26)

As  detailed  by  public  intellectuals/bloggers  such  as Tequila  Sovereign(Lenape  scholar Joanne Barker), some Occupy sites, including Boston, Denver, Austin, and Albuquerque tried to engage  in  discussions  about  the  problematic  and  colonial  overtones  of  occupation  (Barker, October  9,  2011). Barker  blogs  about  a  firsthand  experience  in  bringing  a  proposal  for  a Memorandum  of  Solidarity  with  Indigenous  Peoples,18 to  the  General  Assembly  in  Occupy Oakland.  The memorandum, signed by Corrina Gould, (Chochenyo Ohlone-the first peoples of Oakland/Ohlone), Barker, and numerous other Indigenous and non-Indigenous activist-scholars, called  for  the  acknowledgement  of  Oakland  as  already  occupied  and on stolen  land; of  the ongoing  defiance  by  Indigenous  peoples  in  the  U.S.  and  around  the  globe  against  imperialism, colonialism,  and  oppression;  the  need  for  genuine  and  respectful  involvement  of  Indigenous peoples  in  the  Occupy  Oakland  movement; and  the  aspiration  to  “Decolonize  Oakland,”  rather than  re-occupy  it. From  Barker’s  account  of  the  responses  from  settler  individuals  to  the memorandum,

Ultimately,  what  they  [settler  participants  in  Occupy  Oakland]  were  asking  is whether  or  not  we  were  asking  them,  as  non-indigenous  people,  the impossible? Would their solidarity with us require them to give up their lands, their resources, their ways of life, so that we –who numbered so few, after all –could have more? Could have it all? (Barker, October 30, 2011)

These responses, resistances by settler participants to the aspiration of decolonization in Occupy Oakland, illustrate  the  reluctance  of  some  settlers  to  engage  the  prospect  of  decolonization beyond  the  metaphorical  or  figurative  level. Further,  they  reveal  the  limitations  to  “solidarity,” without  the  willingness  to  acknowledge  stolen  land  and  how  stolen  land  benefits  settlers. “Genuine solidarity with indigenous peoples,” Barker continues, “assumes a basic understanding of  how  histories  of  colonization  and  imperialism  have  produced  and still  produce the  legal  and economic possibility for Oakland” (ibid., emphasis original). 

For  social  justice  movements,  like  Occupy,  to  truly  aspire to  decolonization  non-metaphorically, they would impoverish, not enrich, the 99%+ settler population of United States. Decolonization eliminates settler property rights and settler sovereignty. It requires the abolition of land as property and upholds the sovereignty of Native land and people.

The only thing more shocking than already impoverished people rejecting the call to impoverish themselves further because of events that occurred hundreds of years before they were born is that a majority of the GA supported the endeavor, just not enough for it to actually carry.

SUNDAY AFTERNOON GA: DECOLONIZE

Although I had participated in many of the marches and demonstrations in the fall, including the stunning shutdown of the Port of Oakland, my involvement really began December 4, 2011.  That week, the Sunday GA moved from the evening to 2:00 in the afternoon.  We met in Oscar Grant Plaza (OGP), the Oakland civic center previously named Frank Ogawa Plaza.  It was renamed when it was the site of the OO encampment, which was violently evicted; it was now tenuously claimed by an ongoing 24 hour vigil and the GAs several times a week.

There were a lot of people at this GA.  I had no idea that we would be considering a highly contentious proposal.  A group of Native people were proposing renaming Occupy Oakland—to be called “Decolonize Oakland.”  A term describing colonization and expropriation was not one they wanted to claim for our movement, and they wanted their history acknowledged.

GAs began with an introduction, including the hand signals of approval (twinkling fingers), disapproval (limp fists nicknamed “Quan hands” after our mayor) and impatience (rolling arms to signal time to wrap up a rambling or off-topic speech).  Then we separated into smaller groups for the “forum discussion.”  The topic this week was “What does Occupy mean to you?”  This turned out to be ambiguous and led many groups to focus on the proposed name change.  There were many groups of about twenty people each.  In my group the participants were diverse, respectful and lively.

What was supposed to happen next was report backs about forum discussions, with people summarizing what went on in different groups.   It soon became clear that dozens of people were lining up “on stack” for a chance to speak for or against the motion.  It seemed impossible to maintain the GA agenda structure.  As I remember it, the facilitators took a straw pool to check in about changing the sequence, although some were disgruntled by this procedural move.

I was impressed by the diversity of speakers, the range of opinions, the level of passion and the skill of the two young facilitators.  At one point one of them slowed things down by reminding us all of the emotions expressed at this GA—anger, pride, anxiety, conviction, excitement—I don’t remember the specifics but I remember thinking, “I’ve gone to political meetings for decades and I don’t think I’ve ever heard someone speak explicitly about the feelings in the room.”

The defenders of the Occupy “brand” spoke about the national impact of the shared name, but I remember thinking, “if we can’t even change our name after four months, how can we change the world?”  I even got on stack to say this, but there was a very long line ahead of me and I had to leave before getting a chance (by then the GA had lasted more than three hours).

At that time the operating rules of the GA considered a 90% vote to be a consensus, approving the proposal, and allowed for amendments if 70 to 90% of the group voted in support of a proposal.  I found out later that 68% had voted in favor and that the supporters of Decolonize had separated from OO as result.  A couple of weeks later, on December 16, the GA shifted to the concept of a “living document” that could be amended on the spot, if the proposers agreed.  I wonder whether that GA could have endorsed a compromise hybrid name like Decolonize/Occupy Oakland, and what might have been different if we had–or if we hadn’t been able to even do that.

I was impressed with the GA I attended as a vivid example of “direct democracy.”  At the same time, the damage was evident.  Some supporters of the indigenous people resented disrespectful treatment of their elders, while some of their allies made accusations of racism against the people who wanted to hold onto the name of Occupy.  As I understand it, Decolonize Oakland continued to exist as a separate group and sometimes participated in shared actions with OO, but this GA prevented greater ongoing unity.

(Note: the minutes of this GA can be read at http://occupyoakland.org/2011/12/ga-minutes-12-4-11/  and the proposal can be read at http://occupyoakland.org/2011/12/emergency-proposal-3-on-queue-for-december-4-2011-ga-proposal-to-decolonize-oakland-creating-a-more-radical-movement/)

From the minutes:

F: We’re going to change this topic.  Please discuss: What does this movement mean to you?

The historical context of “occupy” doesn’t fit with the goals of this movement.

Newer people who are just discovering that they are oppressed need to respect the work and presence of those who have already been in the struggle.

People are responding to what we are doing, not to our name.  They are excited about the larger connection to the national movement.

As a daughter of Texas and as a single mom, I think we should stay in keeping with ancestors and elders to rename the space.

We, the congregation of First Christian Church of Oakland,  advocate that this movement be renamed Decolonize Oakland.  We would also advocate for CoExist in Oakland, to embrace all people.

The original intent was to occupy the seat of power.

The term occupy is racist.  In these movements across the country, few people of color are involved.  We have this opportunity to step up.

The history of Wall Street is built on the colonization of the indigenous people, and the slavery of Africans on the land.  The seats of power are within us – we do not need to use the same paradigm of “taking seats of power.”

F: Many people are speaking about a proposal in queue, and are not speaking about the topic, “What does this movement mean to you?”  Please make your comments about the topic.

This must be divine timing.  We did talk about the forum topic.  We accept the concept of “occupy” but we think that it’s time for a change that will reflect everyone’s histories and voices.

In our group, some people liked the term “occupy” because it’s a good brand and it connects to OWS.  We agree that all people’s voices should be heard, but we don’t know how to make decolonize, liberate, and occupy meld together as one.  Some people in our group preferred “liberate” than “decolonize” because “de-“ sounds negative.

This is an opportunity to hold corrupt systems accountable and to protest people who are vulnerable in these systems

F: Let’s see who would like to go straight to the vote?  Who would like to go to pros and cons?  We could try hearing 2 pros and 2 cons.  It seems like many people would like to speak.  We will hear as many as we can.

Pros

I am in support of this proposal as a white person.  I stand in solidarity with all people in the movement. We need to support this proposal on the principle of people who are left out of this movement.

We need to acknowledge that some of us have white privilege.

As Jewish person, I cannot support Palestinian people in a movement named “Occupy.”

We will only be weakened when using the language of our oppressors. The divisiveness here today is a symptom of colonization.  We need to listen to those who are most affected.  Let’s do it.

This language shows how colonized our minds are.  Let’s change the status quo.

I will vote yes on this if the people behind the proposal put their lives into increasing the movement.

I do not want to fly on the coattails of imperialism.

People can understand that we are a part of the global movement, just like “Arab Spring” or “Los Indignados.”

One way that violence is perpetuated is through language.

This issue is not just about indigenous people.  It’s about recognizing the history of the shoulders we stand on.

This proposal has pushed the envelope of this conversation.  It has made you uncomfortable – welcome to my world.  This emergency has been on hold for over 500 years. 

We are more than a brand. Let’s occupy, decolonize, and liberate this.

Cons

Feelings are more important than words.  Words change.  Occupy is used throughout the movement, so we should keep that word. We have broken the process by allowing an emergency proposal to be heard that is not an emergency. 

We have also allowed proposers to speak for 10 minutes.  I am an occupant.  I live here.  I’m not stating an opinion about the name change.  We have not had time to develop this conversation.

[...]

Vote Results:

68.5 % approval: THIS PROPOSAL HAS BEEN TABLED

YES: 198

ABSTAINED: 19

NO: 91

(After some cheering, much confusion and agitation ensued.   Several people started chanting “Decolonize Oakland” for about five minutes.) IMPROMPTU ANNOUNCEMENT(This was said in the midst of the crowd with the People’s Mic, not within the GA process). No matter how you voted, please realize something. Everyone has a place here.  We all need to recognize the power of this conversation.  We want people to come out and be part of Occupy Oakland.  Figure out what you want.  Start listening to the people!  Be about it!  I love you all!! (Another voice…partially muffled – I couldn’t hear everything amidst arguing and people have side conversation). We might  hold our own GA.  Stay connected with us.  We have more work ahead of us.

======================================================

So a movement divided and a bunch of time wasted over a name change because some people didn’t think that their cause was being acknowledged enough. And even after a vote in which most people actually supported the motion and then actually left to form their own Decolonize Oakland group or whatever, they still get libeled as a bunch of callous “settlers”.

Between DINAM and Settlers, if these are the products of Decolonization theory then I can’t see any good in it. It sounds like it wants to pretend to be egalitarian and anti-property, while at the same time privileging one group above all others and ensuring their own property rights to their land, at the expense of everyone else living on it. And yes, at the expense of everyone else living on it:

Not unique, the United States,as a settler colonial nation-state, also operates as an empire-utilizing  external  forms  and  internal  forms  of  colonization  simultaneous  to the  settler  colonial project. This  means,  and  this  is  perplexing  to  some, that  dispossessed  people  are  brought  onto seized   Indigenous   land   through   other   colonial   projects.   Other   colonial   projects   include enslavement,   as   discussed,   but   also   military   recruitment,   low-wage   and   high-wage   labor recruitment     (such     as     agricultural     workers     and     overseas-trained     engineers),     and displacement/migration  (such  as  the  coerced  immigration  from  nations  torn  by  U.S.  wars  or devastated  by  U.S.  economic  policy).  In  this  set  of  settler  colonial  relations,  colonial  subjects who  are  displaced  by  external  colonialism, as  well  as racialized  and  minoritized  by  internal colonialism, still occupy and settle stolen Indigenous land. Settlers are diverse, not just of white European  descent,  and  include  people  of  color,  even  from  other  colonial  contexts.  This  tightly wound  set  of  conditions  and  racialized,  globalized  relations  exponentially  complicates  what  is meant by decolonization, and by solidarity,against settler colonial forces.

So when they’re saying “to support us you have to impoverish all the settlers, ie, everyone that isn’t us,” they’re being very literal. It’s just more bourgeois identity politics cooked up by privileged people in academic institutions.

Into the trash it goes.

[rpbetter]

Users are dog piling on the COAR mod now because I guess they were lying? Best time for change when many speak up at once? What are the prospects?

I'm sorry, but since 90% of things happen only when I'm otherwise occupied, I have to ask...what the hell is going on now??

I don't follow COAR, I used to look at submissions and discussions every week or so, but I like I said in one of the other responses, that whole blog just disturbs me now lol so I haven't been really over there enough to keep up with whatever fresh hell. Frankly, I probably don't want to know at this point, I'm sure it's some kind of Statement that I'm either going to have to try so, so hard to be responsible and mature about refusing to poke fun at or I might actually manage to lose even more faith in people.

So...let me try to get this straight:

People are harassing the COAR mod? Okay, y'all...I'm not going to insult anyone's intelligence or status as an adult by offering some kind of bizarre ass statement like, "I'd better not find out it was anyone from this blog." I mean? Other than blocking people I know to be engaging in bullying, the hell am I going to do to you? Bitch at you? While I am certain me well and truly going off is not a thing anyone wants, that's not a great deterrent until it happens lol So, I will just say that if it was anyone interacting with this blog...that is not something we do here, it is not supported or encouraged, it is not an appropriate way to express your feelings, and I will be really disappointed in anyone doing this kind of shit. Remember how this all started before doing anything like that, please.

Or was it that people were trying to address issues with the mod? Because, despite what the RPC thinks, there is a difference. If that's the case, I'd honestly advise you to just...not. That would not be my advice if it was your mutual or friend, or just someone that seemed inclined to hold a discussion. I do not feel that is the case here, and that any attempt to speak to the mod is only going to result in people who are already suspicious feeling everything they say is either further suspect or confirmation thereof. No one who does already feel like the mod is truthful is going to feel any differently, there's no point. This is not going to be a "win" for anyone.

They were lying, as in this was something confirmed by them, or? And if that is the case, about what? Those are all pretty important factors that I'm unaware of. If they did lie about something and have told the truth, they definitely shouldn't be piled on for that. We should encourage, not discourage, honesty. That's easy when people don't make mistakes, be those mistakes made in good or bad intentions, than it is when they try to address them. It takes a great deal of character to tell people, especially those who are maybe already angry with you, that you've lied. So, if this is what has happened? Advice is to appreciate that honesty was had. You do not have to like or agree with someone to appreciate that. But since I have fuck all of an idea what happened here...just running on possibilities.

Best time for change? In something like a blog that runs on non-RP style interaction, yeah, when many people tell you there is a problem, it's definitely time to accept that there is a problem. And I do not mean "tell you there is a problem" as in scores of anon hate, that just tells you that you exist as a personality on tumblr. Otherwise, if many people are concerned about the same issue or issues, those are valid concerns on a blog like COAR, not cause for another statement telling people to go create their own vent blog as has happened numerous times in the past. At some point, you either accept that the people you have made the blog for are telling you there is a problem you need to fix or you make it worse by staying the course with that problem.

Prospects? The problem with changes is this isn't a democracy. COAR, like this blog, is a dictatorship. No one is set up to allow their users to do something like vote on blog directions, and that isn't as unreasonable as it sounds when we factor in how even that could both done unfairly and that you would still have plenty of people upset about those choices. Point is, no matter how fairly someone runs a blog meant to interact in these ways with the RPC, it is ultimately their decision to do much of anything.

These decisions are based on those blog muns' viewpoints on whatever matter, and as all of us are just human here, those viewpoints are influenced by emotion, experiences, accrued biases. We can either act on them...or not, but they're going to exist as a part of the situation either way. And the only way that can, fallibly, be guessed at is by someone's established actions.

Given those, not great, in my opinion. I would expect COAR to issue a statement, probably one of those "from all the mods" style ones about bothering the one mod, some manner of clarification likelier than not to inflame the situation, tell everyone to unfollow or make their own vent blog, and return to ignoring that anyone has any concerns or objections until such point as everyone forgets about it all or COAR re-tanks.

Really think everyone's best prospect right now is to just stay away from there if they feel mistrust, anger, unsafe, whatever that isn't positive. I'm sure we can all live without that exact format of venting for a while to spare ourselves more of this. Look, I'm not even going to go look at what the shit is going on now unless I absolutely have to for someone, my RPC experience is considerably more peaceful for it...again.

[gatekeeperwatchman]

My Mission Objective:

I want you to know that I am just a man and they will never build a monument in my name.

Life is about establishing relationships called friendship and loving others. Every day of our lives we are given opportunities to show love and kindness to those around us. We must remember that those mortals we meet in parking lots, offices, elevators, the internet, and elsewhere are that portion of mankind God has given us to love and to serve. If we cannot regard those who are all around us as our family, we will never be capable of loving our neighbor or our enemy.

Gatekeeper-Watchman International Group is a Christain based non-profit organization, that is a faith-based group of associates and friends from all over the world but is not limited to, environmental, social, advocacy, and human rights work. It is my passion that we all can work to promote social or political change on a broad scale or very locally. Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups (#GWIG) seek to play a critical part in developing society, improving communities, and promoting citizen participation all over the world through love, kindness, joy, and various forms of living support. As the founder and administrator of Gatekeeper- Watchman International Groups, my primary purpose is to defend or promote specific causes. As not opposed to operational project management, these organizational groups typically seek to raise awareness, acceptance, and knowledge by lobbying, press work, and activist events and are not limited to donations or outside financial support. Our mission is to accelerate and educate the community and world on the importance of why it's pivotal to empower men, women, and minorities in business globally. When the impoverished are elevated financially, communities, states, and countries prosper, this builds a global blueprint that will alleviate and eradicate poverty and redefine our common cause which is a fair and united democracy.

In this overcrowded online world, do you ever wonder why people spend most of their time googling? or sending a friend request without knowing you? I hope your experience with social networking has been good. And please let me introduce you to a fresh outlook on social platforms. In the beginning, I didn’t understand why people would read and share Posts, Blogs, Tweets, and or Comments when the web is awash with information, advice, and wisdom from people more experienced, more knowledgeable than myself.

As I have grown older, my need to search for quality friends, associates, and companions, immediately discovering that it wasn't easy to do. A relationship with intrinsic value and opportunity is also harder to mobilize because of our change in interests and environment. I have always preferred to choose my friends for myself rather than allowing others to do so for me and this is why I contact others that I may not know and that I find articulate, and exciting because we are communal beings.

I have learned that to introduce social and political change on a broad scale, I concluded that sharing, teaching, and discussing problems head-on and the topics of interest may allow us to focus on a particular subject, unlike the media which recklessly spits out more in shorter bytes than we have been able to chew on as a democracy.

In doing so, I have attempted to connect with people across the world. I constantly search for thriving groups of quality friends from many different cultures interests, and scopes of expertise. There, I placed open forums at specific locations and called them Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups. I have intended to ask for prayer, and discussion so that we may encourage others to change the way they gather and extrapolate information while focusing on different perspectives relating to education, employment, social advocacy, and human rights as "Information Specialists".

I believe that we all can work together at promoting change on a broader scale. Likewise, we must all seek different means of sharing our experiences, knowledge, and faith on social platforms if we want to be less cluttered with better resolve.

I am also graciously seeking your support and participation in developing an all-volunteer movement. Your contributions and donations, I believe will support our mission to encourage, accelerate and educate humanity on the importance of why it's pivotal to empower the less fortunate who have fallen between the cracks of bureaucracy globally. When the impoverished classes are elevated financially, communities, states, and countries prosper, and this builds a global blueprint that will alleviate and eradicate greed and selfishness that destroys economic growth and a lack of positive change.

Respectfully,

Steven P. Miller

From: Steven P. Miller CEO/ Founder of Gatekeeper-Watchman International Groups Jacksonville, Florida., Duval County, USA. Instagram: steven_parker_miller_1956, Twitter: @GatekeeperWatchman1, @ParkermillerQ, Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/gatekeeperwatchman URL: linkedin.com/in/steven-miller-b1ab21259 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ElderStevenMiller

GWIG, #GWIN, #GWINGO, #Ephraim1, #IAM, #Sparkermiller,#Eldermiller1981

[anarchy-and-cake]

Thank you for standing with Hong Kong, it's awful but what started the HK protests was Chan Tong Kai, a two-time m*rderer whose jury started the extradition bill which started the protestors defending a criminal! And he did his crime in TAIWAN(democracy) not mainland China! So the root cause was not china invaders or c*ops suddenly going crazy 1st, it was CHAN TONG KAI crimes! Google it! Fucked, so pressed on defending a bunch of criminal-defenders! And they were trump supporters Google it too

Hello anon! I have never put anything relating to the current situation in Hong Kong on my blog, which leads me to believe you are a troll or you have the wrong person. However, I am going to use this as an opportunity to say yes, I do stand with Hong Kong. I am going to explain why.

Your point about Chan Tong-kai is irrelevant. The real issue that started the protests was the extradition bill introduced in April 2019, which would have allowed for criminal suspects to be extradited to mainland China under certain circumstances. This of course would undoubtedly lead to exposing Hongkongers to unfair trials and violent treatment. It’s also possible that the bill would give China greater influence over Hong Kong and could be used to target activists and journalists. The thing to remember here is that mainland China is currently governed by the CCP. This government is well known for the censorship, brutality, and abuse of its citizens. However, Hong Kong is a former British Colony that was handed back to China in 1997, so they have their own judiciary and a separate legal system from mainland China. Under this system, they have rights that citizens in mainland China don’t, like freedom of speech. The extradition bill that was proposed would have given Beijing more power over Hong Kong, and could have been used to undermine the rights of Hongkongers. This is what sparked the protests. Chan Tong-kai just happened to be a prisoner who was going to be extradited at the same time. But even if the protests had been started strictly because of this one person, they have expanded far beyond that, to things like democratic reform and an inquiry into police brutality. If you cannot support a movement for citizen’s rights and safety against an oppressive government simply because you don’t agree with what you believe to be the starting point, I don’t know what to tell you.

Of course, this is just a very basic explanation of the protests in Hong Kong and I encourage everyone who sees this to do more research and learn more about this crisis. Dig deep and form your own opinions. I will link the sources for this post right here: (X)   (X)   (X)   (X)

And of course, I live in the United States, so my knowledge of what is going on will always be limited compared to those who are experiencing it. If there is anyone reading this who is closer to the situation or has more knowledge you’d like to share, please add to this and help educate others. If I’ve put something in here that isn’t true, let me know and I will immediately fix it. My goal is not to spread misinformation. So thanks for the ask, anon.

[arcticdementor]

When we hear the term “Deep State,” we tend to think of people staffing the federal bureaucracy. I want to suggest to you that that is an incomplete way to think about it. The Deep State in Western liberal democracies consist not only of government bureaucrats, but also of the leadership in major corporations, leading universities, top media, medicine and law, science, the military, and even sports. A more accurate way to think about what we are dealing with comes from the Neoreactionary term “the Cathedral,” which NRxers use in more or less the same way that 1950s Beats used the term “the Establishment.” I like the term “Cathedral” because it entails the religious commitment these elites have to their principles. You can no more debate these principles with them than you can debate with a religious fundamentalist. They adhere to them as if they were revealed truths.

Yet they still like to pretend that they are liberals — that they favor open, reasoned discourse. This is, in fact, a lie. It is a lie that they depend on to conceal the hegemonic intolerance that they wish to impose on everybody under their authority.

…

It is true that no society can tolerate everything. What the Cathedral is now doing is radically limiting discourse, and demonizing as heretics all those within its purview who dissent, no matter how reasonable their objections. (And now Facebook is incentivizing some of its users to report their friends as potential “extremists.” Please get off Facebook now!) The Cathedral seeks to make all of society over in the mold of a college campus. The Cathedral is growing ever more radical. In recent months, we have seen the US military embrace wokeness (to use the slang term for the most vibrant and activist form of the Cathedral’s religion). You would think that it makes no sense for the leadership of a racially diverse armed forces to embrace and indoctrinate its officers in a neo-Marxist theory that causes everyone to see everyone else primarily in hostile racial terms, but that is exactly what has happened. In time — and not much time, either — we are going to see young people who were once from families and social classes that once were the most stalwart supporters of the military declining to join the armed forces in which they are taught that they are guilty by virtue of their skin color.

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That’s the Cathedral and its values. The Cathedral has also taken over corporate America, and the professions. I hardly need to elaborate on this further, not for regular readers of this blog. It was a hard knock this past week to see that the US Supreme Court, which some of us had thought would be the last line of defense for anybody traditional in this soft-totalitarian Cathedral theocracy, refused to take on the Gavin Grimm case, and the Barronelle Stutzman case. The Cathedral line in favor of privileging LGBTs over religious people and secular people who don’t accept the full LGBT gospel is hardening.

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I realized over the weekend why I have been so affected by the experience of being here in Hungary these past three months. It has clarified for me the nature of this conflict. First, take a look at this powerful piece by Angela Nagle, writing about the views of Irish intellectual and cultural critic Desmond Fennell. 

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What does this have to do with Hungary? Prime Minister Viktor Orban and his government have brought down the wrath of European Union leaders over Hungary’s recent law restricting sex education for children, and information about LGBT presented to children. The prime minister of the Netherlands, in extraordinarily bellicose language, threatened to “bring Hungary to its knees” over the law. I am reliably informed by an American source in a position to know that in Washington, even among conservative elites, Viktor Orban is seen as nothing but a fascist. I have been writing all summer about the radical disjunction between Hungary as it is, and Hungary as described by Western elite discourse (media and otherwise). This is by no means to say that Orban’s government is flawless — it certainly is not; corruption, for example, is a big deal here — but to say that there has to be some reason why Western elites of both the Left and the Right despise Hungary so intensely, and slander it so.

There’s a lesson in all this, I believe, for where conservatives and traditionalists in the West are, and where we are likely to go. I have come to believe that the standard left-liberal and right-liberal critiques of Orban — “Magyar Man Bad” — are just as shallow as the “Orange Man Bad” critique of Donald Trump. I say that as someone who was critical of Trump myself, though I credited him for smashing the complacent GOP establishment. I write this blog post in the spirit of Tucker Carlson’s excellent January 2016 Politico piece titled, “Donald Trump Is Shocking, Vulgar, and Right.”

I’ve been reading lately a 2019 book, The Light That Failed, by Ivan Krastev and Stephen Holmes. Both men are liberal scholars who undertake to explain why liberalism failed in Central Europe and Russia after the fall of the Cold War. It’s a remarkably insightful book, one that any conservative with an interest in the problem should read, even though its authors are liberal democrats. They write:

A refusal to genuflect before the liberal West has become the hallmark of the illiberal counter-revolution throughout the post-communist world and beyond. Such a reaction cannot be casually dismissed with the trite observation that “blaming the West” is a cheap way for non-Western leaders to avoid taking responsibility for their own failed policies. The story is much more convoluted and compelling than that. It is a story, among other things, of liberalism abandoning pluralism for hegemony. [Emphasis mine — RD]

You would have thought that in any reasonable pluralistic polity, a sovereign nation choosing to restrict what its children can learn about human sexuality would be of little interest to other nations within that polity. After all, Hungary is not France any more than Estonia is England. There is an immense amount of diversity in Europe. But see, the Cathedral’s liberalism — whether in America or in the EU — is not pluralistic, but hegemonic.

Krastev and Holmes (henceforth, “the authors”) point out that after 1989, the West expected Central European countries to imitate them in every way. The authors — who, remember, are liberals — write:

Without pressing the analogy too far, it’s interesting to observe that the style of regime imitation that took hold after 1989 bears an eerie resemblance to Soviet-era elections where voters, overseen by Party officials, pretended to “choose” the only candidates who were running for office.

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The authors explain that the reforms demanded by the West weren’t like “grafting a few foreign elements onto indigenous traditions,” but rather “put inherited identity at risk” and stoked “fears of cultural erasure.” From my perspective, this is what you see when you get over here and start looking more closely at what George Soros and people like him, both within and outside of government, did, and seek to do. And so, as the authors put it:

[P]opulism’s political rise cannot be explained without taking account of widespread resentment at the way (imposed) no-alternative Soviet communism, after 1989, was replaced by (invited) no-alternative Western liberalism.

Here’s something I bet you didn’t know about Viktor Orban. After the 2008 crash, Western governments bailed out banks left and right. When Orban came to power in 2010, he chose not to do that, instead taking the side of hard-pressed Hungarian homeowners who had been allowed to take out home loans in Swiss francs. He and his party passed a law to protect homeowners at the expense of the banks.

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Remember, they wrote this in 2019, but think of this principle applied to now. If you are Viktor Orban, and you look to the West in 2021, you see a United States that is destroying itself with Critical Race Theory wokeness, which is starting to come to Western Europe. You see the Left here in Hungary starting to embrace it (e.g., the Black Lives Matter statue the liberal Budapest city government erected earlier this year), and you know that it will be bad for your country if this poisonous ideology takes root. So you encourage Hungary’s national soccer team not to take the knee before matches.

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And so, the disintegrating West, headed towards shipwreck, is going to bring Hungary to its knees for trying to protect itself.

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The authors go on to say that what it means to be a good Western liberal is changing so fast that people in the East never know for sure what vision of society they are supposed to imitate. Think about what it was like for us Americans. I was born in 1967, and educated by schools, by the media, and by every aspect of culture to believe in Dr. Martin Luther King’s colorblind vision. I took it seriously, and I believed in it, and do believe in it. But now the same liberals who argued for that are now arguing that this vision was wrong — that to truly be against racism, you must train yourself to think in exactly the same categories that white segregationists used prior to the Civil Rights revolution. It makes no sense. You come to understand that you have been conned. Never, ever believe liberals: they will change the rules on you, and blame you for your own confusion.

The authors go on to say that sex education in the schools has been a huge flashpoint of conflict within Central and Eastern European societies. It has to do with parents losing the ability to transmit their values to their children. In the flush of post-1989 enthusiasm, young people didn’t so much rebel against their parents as to feel pity for them, and to stop listening to them. The young took their catechism from the Western cathedral. Sex ed was a neuralgic point of the overall struggle between Central European populists, who believed that the traditions and the national heritage of these countries were in danger of being wiped out by the West. Imagine, then, what Hungarian voters must think when they hear the Dutch prime minister threaten to bring their country to its knees because he knows better what they should be teaching their children than they do.

The authors tell a story about how Viktor Orban, at the time an up-and-coming liberal from the countryside, was publicly humiliated by a well-known liberal MP from Budapest’s urban intelligentsia, who adjusted Orban’s tie at a reception, as if doing a favor for a hick cousin.

They go on to explain Orban’s illiberalism by quoting his criticism that liberalism is “basically indifferent to the history and fate of the nation.” Liberal universalism “destroys solidarity,” Orban believes. (“If everybody is your brother, then you are an only child.”) Orban believes that liberal policies will lead to the dissolution of the Hungarian nation because liberals by nature think of the nation as an impediment to the realization of their ideals.

The authors go on to say that Orban has long campaigned on the abuse of the public patrimony by the regime that governed Hungary after 1989, when Communist insiders used their connections to plunder what was left of the public purse, and left the weak to fend for themselves. This attitude explains Orban’s hostility to the banks after the 2008 crash. “[I]n Central and Eastern Europe, defending private property and capitalism came to mean defending the privileges illicitly acquired by the old communist elites,” they write.

(Readers, did you know any of this context about Orban and other critics of liberalism from Central Europe? Doesn’t it make you wonder what more you’re not being told?)

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What’s preposterous about it? I know these guys are liberals, but what Duda identifies is the difference between soft totalitarianism and hard totalitarianism. In both cases, the Poles don’t get to decide for themselves.

There’s more to the book, but I’ll stop here for today. You don’t have to believe that Viktor Orban or any of these other politicians are saints in order to understand why they believe what they believe — and why people vote for them. The Cathedral did the same thing to Trump and to Trump’s supporters. Yes, there were some Trump voters with disreputable motives, and in any case Trump was by and large not an effective president. But the anti-Trump opposition’s passionate belief in its own righteousness rendered it helpless to understand why so many people hated it, and do hate it still. Trump’s own incompetence made it harder to take that critique seriously.

Trump lost, and most everything he did was wiped away by his successor. Viktor Orban wins — and that is the unforgiveable sin in the eyes of the Cathedral.

Here is the radicalizing thing, though. As you will know if you’ve been reading this blog, Viktor Orban appears to be building a conservative deep state in Hungary. His government has transferred a fortune in public funds and authority over some universities to privately controlled institutions. It is difficult to accept this, at least for me. At the same time, it is impossible for me to look at what has happened in my own country, with the Cathedral now extending its control over every aspect of American life, and to criticize Orban for this. The alternative seems to be surrendering your country and its traditions to the Cathedral, which pretends to be liberal, but which is in fact growing even more authoritarian and intolerant than anything Orban and his party stand for.

It is becoming harder to think of liberalism in the sense we have known it as viable anymore. Me, I would actually prefer to live in a more or less liberal, pluralistic society, where California was free to be California, and Louisiana free to be Louisiana, and so forth. This is not the world we live in.

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The controversy around Viktor Orban is not only about an obstreperous Hungarian politician who doesn’t play well with others. It’s about the future of the West.

UPDATE: To put it succinctly, we might need soft authoritarianism to save us from soft totalitarianism.